The European Union's executive body today rejected demands its financial services commissioner be removed for failing to tackle the worst market crisis in 80 years.
EU Internal Market Commissioner Charlie McCreevy has long been the butt of complaints from the European Parliament, where some members have accused him of being too light-touch in his job and more passionate about attending horserace meetings.
The European Commission has the sole right to initiate pan-EU financial market rules.
Martin Schulz, floor leader of the EU assembly's Socialist bloc, has asked Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso to move McCreevy, Ireland's commissioner, to another portfolio.
Schulz also wants McCreevy and EU Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes removed from a financial market crisis panel Barroso is setting up inside the Commission.
Dutch Kroes is also seen as one of the more liberal members of the Commission and is taking key decisions on plans from many EU states to shore up banks and protect investors.
A Commission spokeswoman rejected the criticism. 'President Barroso has full confidence in Commissioner McCreevy,' Pia Ahrenkilde Hansen told a regular news briefing.
Last month, McCreevy proposed forcing banks to set aside more capital when undertaking risky operations. He will unveil proposals next week to increase the minimum guarantee on bank deposits to €50,000 and to ease the pain of an accounting rule on banks.
Next month, McCreevy is due to propose tough oversight of credit rating agencies, seen by critics as slow to warn investors about the dangers of products that turned toxic in the credit crunch.
McCreevy said this week that he would propose only those rules that had a chance of being adopted as there was no consensus for a pan-EU market regulator. Hedge funds and private equity groups could not be blamed for the crisis, he also said.
